The Doughty Women: Susan What Lies Before Us

Susan Doughty is a Government Girl residing in Washington, D.C. in May of 1942. Sharing an apartment with two friends at the height of the war effort, she treks off to work every day at the Federal Bureau of Investigation in what has been, until now, a humdrum job.

While she worries about her sister, famous war correspondent Kit Doughty, currently stationed in London and recently married, Susan finds herself yearning for her own adventures. Because, by comparison, her existence seems very tame, very safe. Humdrum.

Alas for Susan. A wish once made cannot be easily unmade.

Her promotion at work, from the fingerprinting division to one more secretive involving sabotage and foreign agents, comes with a new boss. Matthew Crowley is tightly wound, buttoned-up, and greets her with a criticism—either of her performance or her appearance—almost every day. Which does not make for the most harmonious of relationships.

Enter Dexter Mulrooney, a handsome, charming Irishman oddly enough in the same line of business. Secret agent. Operative. Spy. He and Susan have barely begun enjoying a possible relationship when he inexplicably disappears. On some spook-like activities, Susan can only assume.

Just about the time she finds that one roommate, Clara Dunlap, is involved with a married man, and that the soldier lover of the other, Betty Draper, has gone missing in North Africa, her life is further complicated by that fact that she is being stalked.